Viacom Has A New Acting CEO

Media company Viacom said on Monday it named Bob Bakish, a 19-year company veteran, as acting chief executive, replacing Tom Dooley.

Viacom said last month that Dooley was leaving on Nov. 15 and the company was expected to name an interim CEO as it decides whether to merge with CBS.

Bakish, who most recently headed the company’s international media networks, was also named president and CEO of Viacom Global Entertainment Group, the company said in a statement.

The new unit combines the international media networks with Viacom’s music and entertainment group.

The appointment comes after Viacom, which owns Nickelodeon, MTV and the Paramount movie studio, hired financial advisers earlier this month to explore a merger with CBS following a proposal by Sumner Redstone’s National Amusements, a majority shareholder of both companies.

“We are determined to move forward aggressively to strengthen Viacom for the future, whether as a stand-alone company or in a potential combination with CBS,” Chairman Tom May said in the statement.

There has been increasing speculation among media industry insiders that CBS and Viacom may recombine, with CBS CEO Leslie Moonves at the helm, after Redstone and his daughter, Shari Redstone, won the battle for control of Viacom, resulting in the departure of Viacom’s former CEO Philippe Dauman in August.

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“We’re not going to stand still while the CBS merger is being evaluated,” Bakish told employees in an e-mail seen by Reuters. “I believe there’s a lot of work we can do in the near-term to make us stronger, no matter what the next chapter of Viacom is. It’s time to move forward.”

Here Are All the Ways You Can Watch MTV’s 2016 Video Music Awards

From Kanye West interrupting Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech to a twerking Miley Cyrus inadvertently starting a conversation about cultural appropriation, MTV’s Video Music Awards have always been a source for historic moments in pop culture.

MTV is making sure that everyone, whether you’re cable-loyal or a cord cutter, gets to watch this year’s event. The awards are taking place in New York City at Madison Square Garden. Red carpet arrivals begin at 6:15 p.m. EST, the pre-show is set to start at 8:00 p.m., and the actual show will begin at 9:00 p.m.

Of course, as always, all of that will be broadcast on MTV. For anyone without cable, it can be live streamed on the network’s website starting at 7:00 p.m. You can also live stream the show as well as behind-the-scenes footage using MTV’s app on iOS, Android, Apple TV, Roku, and Xbox. If you haven’t had enough after all that, MTV will also be broadcasting a live post-show on its Facebook page.

There’s plenty to look forward to at the 2016 VMAs. After releasing her new album Glory, Britney Spears will be performing at the event for the first time in nearly 10 years, and Rihanna will be accepting the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award before she performs a compilation of her hits. You should also expect to see a handful of Olympic champions as Michael Phelps and the “Final Five” will be presenting awards.

DJ Khaled will be hosting the pre-show. Instead of a traditional host for the main event, Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele will break out alter-egos the Shamester and Lizard Sheeple for play-by-play commentary.

MTV Launches New 90s-Nostalgia Channel

VH1 Classic will be rebranded as MTV Classic, a nostalgic mix of the network’s most iconic shows, it was announced Thursday. Favorites like Laguna Beach, Punk’d, Beavis & Butt-head, and Daria will all feature on the new channel, launching Aug. 1.

“From Beavis & Butt-head to Laguna Beach, MTV’s programming vault is a music and pop culture goldmine with universal resonance,” MTV president Sean Atkins said. “MTV Classic gives audiences a modern and artful home for classic MTV programming and — alongside MTV, MTV2, MTV Live, and mtvU — rounds out a diverse portfolio with music and youth culture at its core.”

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The new channel debuts Aug. 1, marking MTV’s 35th anniversary. It will rebroadcast MTV Hour One – also live-streaming on Facebook – followed by a Total Request Live retrospective, The TRL Decade. Monday through Thursday, MTV Classic’s programming block will consist of iconic shows like Daria, Beavis and Butt-head, Cribs, Pimp My Ride, Jackass, and Punk’d. Fridays will highlight classic music series like MTV Unplugged and Storytellers. Weekends will marathon binge-worthy reality gems like Laguna Beach and The Real World.

Check out the first promo in the video above, and get ready to re-live the best of the ’90s and ’00s.

MTV Is Getting a Total Makeover to Reverse Long Ratings Slide

Sean Atkins has a big job in front of him: As the new president of MTV, he has to make the network cool again.

Ratings at the network that defined the 1980s and later gave birth to such cultural touchstones as The Osbournes, Punk’d and Beavis & Butt-Head have been sliding for the past five years, losing nearly half of its audience in the 18-49 demographic. Since 2011, the network has fallen from the No. 8 ad-supported cable network among that demographic to 20th. And rebuilding the core audience – an advertiser’s dream of millennials and Generation Z – has the added challenge of trying to lure viewers who have shifted away from traditional television viewing.

Atkins is betting that music, the network’s original focus, will speak to them, but that doesn’t mean MTV is on the search for a new round of VJs.

“[Our audience] is not asking us for music videos,” he says. “What they’re asking for is that component of music that is constantly evolving, that is unexpected, that gives voice to youth, that is respective of culture.”

For MTV, that means both blending music that’s relevant to its audience into its new, upcoming programming – a total of 14 announced shows – and leaning into its past a bit more than it has, with the return of “Unplugged” and “Wonderland,” its first new live music performance series in nearly 20 years. (“Think Saturday Night Live‘s ratio of music to comedy, only we’re going to reverse it,” says Atkins.)

This re-commitment to music was underlined last month during the network upfronts and after the sudden passing of Prince. Within an hour of the musician’s death being confirmed, the network cleared its schedule and played nothing but Prince music videos for the majority of the day.

Of course, just bringing the M back to MTV doesn’t guarantee the target viewer will return. And Atkins says he’s keenly aware of that.

“This is the most savvy, informed consumer that has ever been,” he says. “MTV has always talked to 18-24 year olds and that’s the group that has always had the highest bullshit meter. … We had one moment where a person in one of our focus groups said ‘What I expect from you is to make MTV as important to me as it was to my mom.’ They’re aware of [the network’s] heritage and they sometimes believe we’re not standing up to it.”

The key to regaining that trust, he says, is to create programming (both musical and otherwise) that is real – and breaks the status quo.

“Our brand is about authenticity,” he says. “How do we bring back that unexpected quality in reality television?”

Media analysts say it may take more than just the unexpected.

“I think in recent years, their core audience is migrating more toward YouTube,” says Eric Handler, senior equity analyst with MKM Partners. “And with the YouTube celebrities – people like Pew Die Pie and Captain Sparkles – 20 years ago, these people would have been on MTV, most likely. … MTV has to figure out a way – as they try to bring music back to the forefront – to [create shows] that are compelling to viewer – particularly youthful viewers and have a little bit of shelf life. In theory, it sounds good. Will it resonate with millennials? Way too early to tell.”

At the same time, Atkins, who was formerly general manager and EVP of digital media and strategy for Discovery Communications, knows that the key to reaching Gen Z and millennials is through digital means.

MTV has always been an early adopter of digital trends, such as Snapchat, he says. But Handler notes that early adoption isn’t a guarantee of success.

“They’ve been trying a bunch of digital things over the year but if you don’t have a critical mass TV audience, you’re not going to have a pool of people to send to your digital sites,” he says.

Regardless of the size of the current digital footprint, Atkins says he plans to build on that presence with a slate of executives who all have strong digital backgrounds.

“There’s not a single senior manager who’s not breathing both sides of the DNA,” he says. “A lot of what the team is focused on now is ‘how do we express our brand vision in other formats?’ From a creative process, what’s the right content for our audience, then what platform is it best suited for?”

Spotify Wades into Video, Can It Compete With the Giants There Already?

Most of Spotify’s 75 million subscribers probably think of it as their favorite music streaming service. Will they love it just as much for streaming video? The Swedish company is hoping—and betting—that they will by pouring a significant amount of resources into creating original video programming.

According to a recent report from Bloomberg, Spotify is planning to unveil a slate of original video shows starring actors and artists such as Tim Robbins and Def Jam Records producer Russell Simmons, and it is looking for other Hollywood partners.

The company took some baby steps into the video streaming market last year when it started showing short clips from networks such as Comedy Central, Vice Media, and the BBC. But the plan to add about a dozen new TV-style series marks a substantial expansion of Spotify’s video ambitions.

“Music will always be most important, but our audience likes us and wants more from us,” Tom Calderone, the company’s head of content partnerships, told Bloomberg. “We have to figure out a second act, and I think it will come out of video.”

It seems clear that Calderone—who joined Spotify earlier this year—was hired to be the architect of this new venture considering the fact that he spent almost two decades at entertainment giant Viacom working on MTV and other channels, and most recently, he was the president of the company’s VH1 video channel.

The only problem with Spotify’s expansion strategy is that there are already some large and well-funded players in the video market, including an 800-pound gorilla named YouTube. Apple—which happens to have more cash on hand than almost any other publicly-traded company in the world—recently joined those ranks.

Apple has broadcast video specials by musicians in the past, including a concern film from Taylor Swift. The iPhone maker has also been working on more elaborate original offerings, such as a six-part series called Vital Signs, loosely based on the life of Dr. Dre.

Spotify doesn’t just have its sights set on music-related video either. It also wants to create original comedy and animated shows that might appeal to a younger audience. Those ambitions will not just put it up against YouTube or Apple, but will take it directly into the path of a couple of other major players in video entertainment, namely Netflix and Amazon, both of whom have been investing billions.

Calderone’s comment that Spotify needs a “second act” is also somewhat telling. The music service wouldn’t need another act if the first one was still growing rapidly and/or profitable, which it pretty clearly isn’t. With 75 million subscribers, Spotify is already one of the largest subscription music services, and yet it continues to hemorrhage money—much like virtually every other digital music service.

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The reality is that streaming music is a terrible business, and it doesn’t show any signs of improving soon. Ask Rdio, which filed for bankruptcy last year, or Pandora, which acquired Rdio and then started shopping itself around to potential acquirers, or Deezer, the European service that called off a planned public offering.

So Spotify is looking for growth, and hopefully some semblance of financial health, in video. But if anything, video is an even more capital-intensive market with equally slim (or non-existent) profit margins. Apple and YouTube have far greater resources than Spotify will ever have, even after raising $1 billion in debt financing.

Searching for a second act is smart, and video may seem like the way forward. But Spotify is moving from a business in which it is the leader to one in which it is a tiny, underfunded competitor among dozens of much larger players. Although success is not out of the question, the odds are stacked against it.

Why Isn’t Kanye West Being Hurt by His Epic Meltdowns?

Congratulations, Kanye West! The hip-hop artist’s latest album, “The Life of Pablo,” has topped the Billboard 200 chart, making it the seventh album of his career to hit number one.

West’s chart dominance is all the more remarkable when one considers that he appeared to be going through some kind of public meltdown just a couple of months ago. He kicked it off on February 9 with a tweet proclaiming comedian Bill Cosby innocent of the rape allegations leveled against him. One week later, extremely not-safe-for-work audio was leaked, featuring a massive tantrum thrown by the artist backstage at “Saturday Night Live.”

It all made up for the kind of month that a publicist would not want to have. But despite a solid month of questionable behavior, the chart dominance of “The Life of Pablo” shows that West paid no price for his prolonged tantrum.

Common sense would seem to dictate that a public meltdown such as this one would do some kind of lasting damage to a celebrity’s career. Indeed, many a celebrity has thrown a tantrum, had a meltdown or behaved in an otherwise generally unacceptable fashion, never to be heard from again. But it’s not a hard and fast rule by any means.

Many celebrities have had full public unravelings that appeared absolutely fatal to their careers, only to bounce back. Sometimes, they even came back and found more success than they had in their pre-meltdown days.

It’s hard to say exactly why some celebrities survive meltdowns while others don’t. Some seen to have won public sympathy by being contrite, and honest with fans about what caused them to snap. Others have had trips to jail or rehab, which perhaps gave them time to reboot their brands. And still others, like Kanye, seem to just be Teflon — the public continues to love them in spite, or because, of their meltdowns.

Fortune presents a look at five celebrities who pulled a Kanye, by surviving a career-threatening meltdown and coming back stronger than ever.

Best Fight and Steamiest Kiss Grab Spotlight At MTV Movie Awards

Leonardo DiCaprio’s bear brawl and a steamy smooch from Fifty Shades of Grey are among the movie moments battling for popcorn-shaped accolades at the MTV Movie Awards, where cheeky humor and naughty acts often upstage the winners at the youth-orientated event.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens, the third-highest grossing film of all time, leads the nominees with 11 nods and will compete for movie of the year on Saturday alongside Jurassic World, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Creed, Deadpool, and Straight Outta Compton.

Viacom’s MTV Movie Awards, which will tape late Saturday in Los Angeles and air on the MTV network on Sunday, ushers in the summer blockbuster season, featuring stars from upcoming action movies such as Captain America: Civil War, The Huntsman: Winter War, and Suicide Squad.

It’s all about the unpredictable at the MTV Movie Awards, hosted by comedian Kevin Hart and action star Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, where fans vote for their favorite films and performances from the year.

The show honors the year’s biggest action-packed blockbusters that usually tend to be shunned during Hollywood’s annual awards season.

This year’s irreverent categories include best fight–Oscar-winner Leonardo DiCaprio and the Bear from The Revenant are among the nominees–and fan favorite award for best kiss.

The best kiss nominees includes Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan from erotic movie Fifty Shades of Grey, Chris Hemsworth and Leslie Mann from comedy Vacation and comedian Amy Schumer and Bill Hader from raunchy comedy Trainwreck.

Last year’s awards show saw Zac Efron grab co-star Dave Franco’s crotch when the two accepted the award for best comedic duo on stage, while Schumer shared a passionate kiss with model Amber Rose.

How This MTV Show Led to a Major Decline in Teen Pregnancy

Watching reality TV can be good for you—especially if you’re a teenage girl.

A study released on Thursday by the McKinsey Global Institute determined that the high rate of teenage pregnancy is one of six major factors holding women back in the U.S. One effective tool for lowering that number? Media, according to the report.

McKinsey cites a 2014 study that determined that the MTV show 16 and Pregnant “led to more searches and tweets regarding birth control and abortion, which may have contributed to a 5.7% reduction in teen births in the 18 months following its introduction, which is one-third of the overall decline in U.S. teen births during that period.”

The reality show, which follows teen mothers in their daily lives, was initially created in 2009 and later spun off into Teen Mom and Teen Mom 2, which featured many of the same moms from the original series.

Seeing firsthand the sacrifices that the women in the show make—from things as small as missing the prom to not finishing school—is more powerful than being told not to have unprotected sex by a teacher or parent, says Lauren Dolgen, creator of the show, head of west coast reality programming and EVP of series development for MTV.

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Dolgen says she helped create the show, in part, to educate MTV’s young audience. “I had read an article about teen pregnancy [that cited] this really staggering number of teen pregnancies in the U.S. I thought, ‘Oh my God, this is completely affecting our audience, we have to talk about it,'” Dolgen says.

That number is indeed staggering: Approximately 600,000 women between 15 and 19 become pregnant every year, according to McKinsey. That’s more than in any other developed country, and closer to the number of teen pregnancies in African countries like Botswana and Djibouti, notes Kweilin Ellingrud, lead author of the McKinsey report.

Aside from being an emotional and financial burden on the mothers themselves, teen pregnancy comes at a huge cost for the U.S. In 2010, teen births cost the country nearly $10 billion in public assistance, health care, and lost income from the mothers, according to the report.

While McKinsey cites income inequality as the main driving force behind youth pregnancies, Dolgen says the number one issue for the girls in MTV’s shows lack is education.

“Even if it’s an uncomfortable conversation, it’s a conversation we need to have,” she says.

Viacom Needs to Sell Assets or Take Itself Private

Viacom’s share price has gotten a bit of a boost over the past week or so, rising by about 10% from its lows VIAB. Unfortunately for the movie and TV company, that means it is still more than 50% lower than it was a year ago. Some investors and analysts believe the only way out is for Viacom to sell some of its assets and/or take itself private.

Pressure has been building on the company for the past several months in part because of the decline of the stock. At least some of that decline has been a result of uncertainty surrounding the fate of 92-year-old billionaire Sumner Redstone, who controls about 80% of the voting shares in the company and is reportedly in poor health.

Some of that uncertainty was removed earlier this month when CEO Philippe Dauman was given the additional title of chairman of the board, replacing Redstone. But a number of investors, including activist hedge fund SpringOwl, saw this as a step backward due to their concerns about Dauman’s abilities as chief executive (as well as his substantial compensation package).

Those concerns were given even more fuel at the same time the Dauman news broke when it became clear that Sumner Redstone’s daughter Shari—who controls 20% of the votes and is vice chairman of the Viacom board—also opposed his appointment.

Activist investor Mario Gabelli, whose funds are the single largest shareholder in Viacom apart from the Redstone family, has argued for some time that Viacom should sell some of its assets. He has suggested selling a stake in the Paramount movie studio to Chinese conglomerate Alibaba, something Gabelli said could provide enough revenue for the company to invest in some new TV channels and other content.

Apple said to be struggling with its TV service

Others are recommending that Viacom sell Paramount altogether. The studio, which Redstone acquired in 1994 for close to $10 billion, is now estimated to be worth less than half that amount, in part because of a string of lackluster films.

Paramount’s performance shows that it is “not important to keep,” Danny Leibowitz of hedge fund Act II Partners told The Hollywood Reporter recently. “It’s unrelated to the rest of the company, other than maybe some TV production,” Leibowitz said.

Others, however, don’t believe that selling Paramount to raise cash is going to help Viacom’s central problem.

“People are asking Viacom to sell Paramount because they think the cable networks business is falling apart, but raising a little more cash does nothing to change that,” Doug Creutz of Cowen and Co. told THR. Todd Juenger of Sanford C. Bernstein said in a recent note that “the old business of serving kids/teens with linear TV networks is doomed,” and that Viacom is unlikely to win the digital version of those markets.

For Juenger, one solution is for Viacom to sell off some of its more marketable assets, including Paramount and BET, and then take the remainder of the company private. The problem, he says, is that there would still be a massive value gap:

“When we lay out our itemized list of sale-able assets and estimated liquidation values ($8.5 billion), we believe the private equity value of the remaining assets ($12 billion) is well below the public market enterprise value ($18bn),” Juenger said in a note. “After the creditors were paid off, the equity value could be as little as half of the current public market cap.” So that doesn’t look like a great exit for Viacom either.

Ad Deal with Snapchat Is a Lone Bright Spot at an Ailing Viacom

Viacom may have settled (for now at least) questions over who is running the show, with CEO Philippe Dauman taking on the added role of chairman. But that hasn’t changed the stock market’s pessimistic view of the company’s performance and future prospects.

Viacom’s shares VIAB fell by more than 20% on Tuesday after weak earnings results. On a conference call with analysts, Dauman took the opportunity to rail against his detractors.

There is one potential bright spot amid the earnings gloom for the entertainment giant, however: Viacom has extended its advertising deal with Snapchat, the new-media superstar with the massive millennial user base. The two said Tuesday that they had signed a multi-year deal in which Viacom would be the exclusive third-party seller of Snapchat ads.

Under the arrangement, Viacom’s “Velocity” unit will sell ads for Snapchat, including for its popular Live Stories section, which has become a key source of news for many users by aggregating articles based on geographical location. Viacom will also sell ads internationally for the company, not just in the U.S.

As part of the Viacom deal, Snapchat is adding some new channels to its Discover section, where media companies offer up their stories and videos. Comedy Central is getting a new international version along with Viacom-owned Paramount Pictures. MTV will be getting its own Discover channel as well. Other Discover partners include Vice and CNN.

How Snapchat could steal Facebook’s ad revenue

According to the Wall Street Journal, the Snapchat deal came together after Viacom’s CEO met with Snapchat CEO and co-founder Evan Spiegel in Los Angeles. Dauman eventually became so involved with the arrangement that he weighed in on what color the Comedy Central icon should be on the Snapchat Discover page (it’s green).

The deal is a classic marriage of convenience for both parties: Snapchat, which has been growing quickly but doesn’t have a huge amount of revenue, gets access to a media conglomerate with an ad platform that can reach into areas Snapchat never could. Viacom, meanwhile, gets to ride on Snapchat’s coat-tails somewhat and possibly boost the profile of some of its media properties with the app’s millennial user base.

The rest of Viacom certainly isn’t setting the house on fire when it comes to growth. The teen and millennial markets that the company has targeted in the past through assets like Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, and MTV are going elsewhere, including to platforms such as Snapchat and Instagram. As a result, Viacom’s ad business has been declining.

In a note to its clients on Tuesday, investment research firm Moffett Nathanson said: “For the last two years, Viacom has been the classic value trap— a stock with seemingly attractive valuation with arguably conservative earnings assumptions. However, fast forward to today and it’s clear that the stock was cheap for a reason. We have clearly put too much trust in the old playbook — the same has changed.”

The financial aspects of Viacom’s business have also been taking a back seat—at least publicity-wise—to ongoing speculation about the fate of controlling shareholder Sumner Redstone, who is 92 years old and in poor health, according to some reports. Redstone has been at the center of an ongoing battle between Dauman and a former Redstone girlfriend, who has accused the CEO of improperly taking control over the billionaire’s health care.

In addition to that, the future of Viacom contains another important question mark, which is how control of the company will be handled after Redstone’s death. His $42-billion stake in Viacom and CBS is supposed to pass to a trust directed by a board that includes Dauman and Redstone’s daughter Shari. But Shari Redstone made it clear during the recent appointment of Dauman as chairman that she didn’t support the CEO getting this additional role.

This tension is certain to crop up again at some point, and until it is resolved it’s unlikely that shareholders are going to feel comfortable about Viacom’s prospects, despite the occasional blast of good news such as the Snapchat ad deal.